Forum:Hess Agreement
So the first half of Walsh's first scene, the leadoff of Chapter 2, largely fills the function of giving a quick recap of the major threads of the series up to this point. (The second half involves him more or less telling his Scotland Yard tail that his, Walsh's, "lot" are going to "make trouble." No details, but if he's going to discuss such things so nearly-openly with the enemy, I worry the dramatic tension we'd anticipated might suffer.) Anyway, the recap includes some much-desired new information: specifics of the Hess Agreement. For one thing, the communique Hess carried was addressed to both Chamberlain and Daladier; the assumption was that London would forward it to Paris. Apparently Hitler realized that just because Chamberlain and Daladier had stood up to him at Munich didn't mean they weren't complete pussies, because the Agreement is ridiculously one-sided. All Hitler offered was the withdrawal of German troops from territories beyond the recognized prewar Franco-German border. Czechoslovakia, Belgium, the Netherlands, Denmark, and Norway all stay occupied--Walsh was clear on that point. So if Britain and France both complete the Big Switch Back, the Wehrmacht can project its power right back to their doorsteps. There's no information on an agreement for how to handle the running proxy war in Spain, and nothing like "Germany will be obligated to double-cross Italy in North Africa upon British request," as we've suggested elsewhere. (It is worth noting, by the way, that Hossbach did not include Italy in his rundown of SecCo members in Chapter 1.) Maybe the outline Walsh provided was incomplete, focusing only on those items which were of direct interest to the big picture. It seems counterintuitive that there'd be so few clauses to so significant a diplomatic agreement, especially since Walsh implied that negotiations between Hess and Chamberlain's government (and Daladier's, I guess) went on for some little while in TBS. Anyway, I create this forum to ask how we want to handle it now that there's finally some information on the Hess Agreement. I always figured I'd write a new article, but there's so little meat to what we've learned that there hardly seems to be a point. Another option would be to write it into the transitional section between the sections that deal with the first two stages of the war on World War II (The War That Came Early). Or maybe something else altogether? Turtle Fan (talk) 06:30, July 31, 2012 (UTC) :I'm ok with creating an article. If you look over at wikipedia proper at the Tripartite Pact article, for example, the article itself is not terribly long. At least half the length is the text of the agreement itself (which is itself quite short). And it was a pact of some importance to the overall war. :With the Hess Agreement, we'd have the important parts of the agreement. The only (probable) signatories would have been Britain, France, and Germany. A couple of paragraphs on the state of the war in the West before the agreement, a few lines on what Hess did, a note about Churchill's opposition and death, the final implimentation and terms, and the fact that it was shredded the following year by Britain (I presume). TR (talk) 14:54, July 31, 2012 (UTC) :Might want to wait until the book comes out but a stub article would be appropriate. I'm about half way through TBS so can't really comment further. ML4E (talk) 16:20, July 31, 2012 (UTC) ::The book's out. I've got it on my Kindle. One of the nice things about preordering a book on the Kindle is that it downloads almost immediately after the stroke of midnight on the day it's due to be released. No need to wait for the bookstore to open, if you're really, really in a great hurry to start reading. (On the other hand, on at least two occasions that I can remember I was able to buy hard copies of TL-191 books before the release dates. Doesn't matter so much these days, since I no longer spend the whole year waiting for the next installment on needles and pins like I did in 191's glory days.) :::How about that. For some reason I thought it wasn't coming out until the fall. I spent an unexpectedly pleasant evening last night perusing it in a bookstore. ML4E (talk) 19:35, August 1, 2012 (UTC) ::If I find something later in the book that gives additional information about the Hess Agreement, I will of course update the article accordingly. Turtle Fan (talk) 18:50, July 31, 2012 (UTC) Category:Forum